I have a friend who owns a farm out in Pomaria, a very small town outside of Columbia. One day he got a call from a family asking to buy a sheep. Skeptical to sell one of his sheep to a stranger, but forever the optimist, he invited the family out to his farm. The family came, bought the sheep, and asked him if they could have a bucket of water and have a picnic under one of the big trees on the property that afternoon. He agreed and watched a ritual he had never seen before.
The family prayed over the sheep and calmed it down with their soothing voices. They slowly revealed a blade and slit the sheep’s throat, allowing the blood to run onto the ground. When the blood was drained from the sheep’s body, it was skinned, and cut apart so that every single part of the sheep could be used for various things - the skin, bones, stomach - it was all packed away for the family to use later. They stayed for hours, making sure that every piece of sheep would have a purpose. When my friend later walked out to the place under the tree where the sheep had been slaughtered, he was surprised to find that there was barely any trace of the sheep left - just a little blood on the grass.
As my friend told me this story, I asked him, “weren’t you upset that they slaughtered one of your sheep?” He shrugged and said, “It wasn’t my sheep. The sheep belonged to them and they can use it however they want to use it. I’m just glad they used the whole thing. Nothing went to waste.”
When I think about that family and that sheep, I think about all of the parts of an animal that I would have absolutely no use for. What do you do with the eyes? The horns? The hooves? Even if you are able to eat most of the meat of the sheep, what are you going to do with the intestines? The bones?
But the sheep was precious to these people. They knew the great wealth in using every part of the sheep. They understood what it meant to own something and use the entire thing.
The shepherds of Jesus’ time understood this too. The sheep belonged to the shepherd so the shepherd was able to use the sheep in whatever way he chose. The shepherd recognized that every single part of the sheep was precious. Some parts we would expect - bones being made into sewing needles - but some parts being considered so diligently and uniquely - the stomach sew to carry water.
Nothing was wasted because the shepherd knew that each sheep was precious and worth being used. He also simply couldn’t afford to waste any part of the sheep.
When the sheep are all you have to secure the future of your family, you are very careful and particular about how you use the sheep. Without an abundance of healthy sheep, the shepherd would risk the wellbeing of his family. Without their sheep they would have no livelihood.
Just as we invest in our future and our family’s future with stocks, bonds, retirements funds, real estate and life insurance, shepherds invested in the future of their family by nurturing a large, healthy flock. A growing flock meant a future, an inheritance, for the shepherd’s offspring.
So when we understand how much the flock means to the shepherd, it is no surprise that a good shepherd would lay down his life for his sheep. He is not only protecting his pets or his income, but his future and his family’s future.
In this passage, Jesus makes a promise to his people, his flock. He commits his life to the wellbeing of the sheep, he declares that he will do everything it takes to protect them, keep them safe - even to the point to death. What he is promising is a future - an inheritance for his family.
But we are not only the inheritors of the sheep - the inheritors of the wool, blankets, and meat that came from the sheep. Jesus says that we are the sheep. We are the ones that will be slaughtered and used at the will of the shepherd to whom we belong. And the crazy part is that God is using not just the good parts, not just our gifts, but also our faults, our failures, our sins for God’s purposes. God wants all of us - every piece of skin, bone, and stomach - leaving nothing unused.
I read a news article this week about a new first person video game. It’s called Outcasted and in the game, the player is posed as a homeless person begging for change in a random location. There are no levels, no achievements. The only way you are able to interact with another character is to hold their eye contact, hold out your hand, and ask for money. The makers of the game hope that it will help people better empathize with the monotony and despair that homeless people feel on a daily basis. And it has worked. It is changing the way people walk through their lives, making them think twice about ignoring the man sitting outside the grocery store every afternoon.
God is using everything - even the weird stuff. Not just the improved parts of us or the successful parts of us. Not just our great singing voices or our steady hands. God is using our quick tempers and our low self esteem. God is using our deep rooted prejudices and our crumbling marriages. God can and will use every part of us for God’s purposes. And sometimes that involves what feels like to be slaughtered.
Jesus never tells us that we will be shielded from potential danger in the pasture. He never says that he won’t lead us to the edge of a cliff or into the midst of wolves. But what he does say is that he will gather us in, keep us together. He will come after us when we stray. He says that when the wolves come to prey on us - and they will - that he will lay down his life to protect us. Because we are part of the flock, we can trust that when the Spirit leads us to frightening places, uncomfortable places, Christ is with us. His voice calls our names and comforts us. We are protected and provided for.
Miss Martha is about four foot nine. She is a tiny, fierce lady in her late sixties. Miss Martha is unemployed. She lives in a small one-bedroom house in a run down part of the neighborhood with her tiny dog Miko. She has two industrial sized freezers that stay stocked with chickens, ground beef, and an assortment of vegetables. Her garage is packed with rice, beans, bread, and anything else a family could want for - “only the healthy stuff,” she tells you with a knowing nod.
Miss Martha is unemployed, but she is not jobless. Miss Martha feeds all of the hungry families in her neighborhood. And in that neighborhood, there are more than a few hungry families. She recognizes her call to be a mother to all, a provider, a nurturing hand and kind heart. “My call comes from God,” she says, “and my ability to do my call comes from God.”
Miss Martha makes absolutely no money doing what she does. She is only able to give because of the generosity God has put in the hearts of the people around her. Several times a week, church members, high schoolers, businesspeople will come through the gate of her chain link fence bearing gifts - bags of food for the neighbors, carts of frozen food, and checks for Miss Martha’s electricity or water.
I once asked Miss Martha if she ever got worried that she would run out of food for the neighborhood or money to pay her electric bill. She smiled and said, “Oh no. God made a promise that God would provide. You believe that, you don’t ever have to worry.”
Miss Martha recognizes that she was being called by God to an uncomfortable, challenging, holy place. She has faith that God will provide her with everything she needs and in her faith she has the freedom to let herself be used by God. And God uses her to do God’s will - God uses every part of Miss Martha, the good and the bad, her mistakes and her passion. Even in the moments of most discomfort - when she receives a late notice on her bill - when she cannot afford to buy food - she trusts in God’s provision.
Many of us do not have the same trust in God that Miss Martha has. It is why we cling so tightly to the image of Christ’s hesitation in the garden. Yes! We know what that feels like. Yet the cross is so mind-boggling to us. We cannot wrap our heads around that kind of faith. Jesus had faith in God that God would provide. He was able to go to the slaughter with a calm heart and steady hand because he had faith in the resurrection. He knew that he belonged to God and would be used according to God’s will.
It is the great paradox of our faith. In order to follow God, we will be led by the Spirit to uncomfortable places, places that often times look like the cross of Christ. We are led to these places by the same God that promises to keep us safe, to redeem us and the entire world. And it is in those uncomfortable places that God most clearly reveals God’s redemptive power.
Having the faith to be led to these challenging, holy places is what the kingdom of God looks like. Dwelling in the uneasiness of being slaughtered will change our lives. It will challenge us to shake hands, hug, and sincerely say “peace be with you” to the man who mugged you at the grocery store. It will challenge us to approach the same communion rail with a person who has abused her spouse or his child. It will bring us to share a hymnal with the outspoken racist. It will give us the freedom to lay down our lives for one another so that they might live, so that there might be an inheritance and a future for the ones who come after us.
